Full Contact

I made six new points of contact just before I fired my gun.
Elbows braced on the rock wall,
haunch and feet on stone and soil
the kinglet perched on my shoulder. 
The thing that gave me a shot was good connection.
The thing that gives me any shot at all.

Cheek to stock
finger to trigger
pin to primer
the lake of my life as predator lapping at the shores of my life as prey
we come together.

The bullet finally touching the deer 
is a finale 
of reaching 
out
to strangers
to neighbors
to ancestors
to the next hill
over the river
there is a bridge
connecting the banks 
of my fear to my desire
like the geese stitching straight south from here to there.
It seems like such a long way 
but they cinch together time and space
so I can sit here, hungry, through one sunset
cold as the boulder I’m trying to be
and feel a little warmth from the fieldmouse
sneaking into my pocket, stealing seeds.

The deer fell and painted a white rock, red
coloring a pale place, boldly
laying against the hillside, wholly
I dipped a finger in her death

There’s this theory of novelty that says the only thing the universe really wants, is more.
The only way for it to be whole is to be everything.
Diversifying like divide and conquer but never a full division, a bifurcation, and not really a bi, but as many branches as we can bear, and not really conquer but meet, embrace, become.
Branches reaching toward union. 
Each new branch closer to union than the one before
until there’s no space left between.

With a blade, I split her belly, but only to the breast
I'm bound again with my shadow dog 
the way you only can be over a gut pile. 
Even now, days later, she's tight beside me
the caul fat wrapped around us, too.